Joe Rosenblatt : Poems

Combustion

Padding through the pampas grass
I see this silent panther greet
some frozen sparrow with a kiss
while another cat strides across the lawn
and Teddy joins his brother, Felix
in contemplation of the perfect still life.

Mother Sunlight dabs their tranquil faces
as though in deep atonement and despair
for the world's carnivorous sin
and all her twisted appetites.

Illumed, the duo let a lacquered beetle pass
before they hum an inward psalm
for their tiny friend, at rest—
under that feeder in the garden.